I stumbled upon the Zynthian open source synthesizer platform project some months ago and found myself visiting the site even more often than hacker news. Eventually, I ended up buying a Zynthian build kit and did not suffer buyer's remorse since I was looking for a new hobby project anyways which would not be at least entirely coding. Zynthian is in a nutshell, an open source synthesizer platform. It comes bundled with a set of open source Linux synths, effects, and other audio software. The kit I ordered contains a Raspberry Pi, an RPI sound-card, touchscreen, some audio ports, and encoders. All this is connected via a purpose-built printed circuit board. I was a bit rusty on my soldering skills so while waiting for the parts to arrive, I practiced a bit on some old hardware salvaged from my parent's farm. I just merely desoldered and soldered components as a way to practice The actual building was relatively easy, mostly because of the fantastic instructions provided
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